Danish pace can shock England

For the moment, England have no mountains to climb. Their World Cup has reached a plateau of qualified optimism from where they will fly to Niigata this morning to prepare for the second-round match against Denmark in the Big Swan Stadium tomorrow night.

For the moment, England have no mountains to climb. Their World Cup has reached a plateau of qualified optimism from where they will fly to Niigata this morning to prepare for the second-round match against Denmark in the Big Swan Stadium tomorrow night.

Niigata, a port on Japan's north-west coast, is a dream-like landscape, surrounded by snow-capped peaks, hot springs and sleepy lagoons. Similarly, for England and their followers, the idea of winning the World Cup this time may even now be a remote prospect except in the more feverish dreams. Beating Denmark would probably bring England up against Brazil in the quarter-finals.

Yet the fact that Sven-Goran Eriksson has an international team worthy of the description is real enough and no small achievement given the difficulty he had fielding a recognisable England side in the warm-up matches, not to mention the problems caused by the late withdrawals of Steven Gerrard and Gary Neville.

As Steve McClaren, the Middlesbrough manager who is also part of Eriksson's coaching staff, said yesterday: "Our back four has two players from Leeds and two from Arsenal, three Manchester United players are in midfield and our two strikers are from Liverpool, but we are an England team and not a collection of club cliques.

"This is a measure of what Sven has achieved since he took over. The squad has come together so well. We don't have to worry about who plays where for what club and who they can play with."

Tomorrow's team will almost certainly be the side born out of the leg injury suffered by Owen Hargreaves early in the Argentina match, the side that ensured a place in the knock-out stage by playing it safe in a featureless, scoreless draw with Nigeria.

For Eriksson, however, the ends justify the means. England required only a point to go through and there was no point in taking needless chances.

The pitch temperature in Osaka on Wednesday reached over 90F. McClaren admitted that the conditions: "Did take a lot out of the players."

For McClaren and the rest of the backroom staff the priority will be to maximise the short recovery time available to get the team refreshed in time to play Denmark.

Ashley Cole was the only casualty against Nigeria and his calf injury is expected to heal in good time. Hargreaves, however, is still nursing a damaged leg and will probably be available again only if England reach the later stages.

For the moment team selection is not an issue. Nor is Eriksson likely to alter the system, given that Denmark's style closely resembles the Swedes'.

"Denmark will be difficult opponents," McClaren predicted. "I've watched the video of their game against France and the French found it very difficult breaking them down. The Danes are well organised with plenty of pace up front and on the wings, and they are very tough in midfield.

"Yet we know Denmark's team well because so many of them play in England. Nothing they do will really surprise us."

That said, England were equally familiar with Sweden but in the end were only spared defeat by the excellence of David Seaman's goalkeeping. The lessons of that opening match, when they took the lead only to give away the ball, a goal and very nearly the game will have to be remembered tomorrow if England are not to run the risk of elimination.

From what McClaren said Eriksson is not about to abandon the exercise in containment and counter-attack which has brought him thus far. Nicky Butt will continue to play a holding role in midfield, providing both a shield for the defence and, with Paul Scholes, an attacking platform.

So far the only goals scored by England have come from a corner by David Beckham, which saw Sol Campbell head in against Sweden, and Beckham's match-winning penalty against Argentina. Michael Owen has hit an Argentine post while Scholes has seen a shot pushed against a post by the Nigerian goalkeeper.

McClaren remained professionally sanguine yesterday about the likelihood of England starting to score goals in open play, giving the coach's usual response about the regular creating of chances ensuring that some would eventually be taken.

Criticism of Emile Heskey's failure even to look like finding the net drew the retort that the striker was "holding the ball up very well, working very hard and always getting into good positions".

Provided goals come from somewhere against Denmark neither the source, the method nor, indeed, the identity of the scorer will matter much. At the same time it was good to learn that Eriksson's players are practising not only taking penalties but the anxious walk from the centre circle in the event of a shoot-out.

From now on in the World Cup, drawn games will go to penalties if sudden-death extra-time does not produce a golden goal. England have lost World Cup shootouts to Germany in 1990 and Argentina in 1998 with a further defeat by the Germans on penalties in Euro 96.

"You can practise taking penalties and walking up to take them," said McClaren, "but you can't recreate the atmosphere and the pressure. Nor can you be sure who will be around to take them or who will want to take them."

If England are fated to lose to the Danes tomorrow or the Brazilians in the quarter-finals then they would surely want to go out some other way. This particular hard-luck story is wearing a little thin.